


Where I Keep My Memories

by gamerfic



Series: In Sleep [10]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Amputation, Angst, Depression, Dreamsharing, F/M, Lucid Dreaming, Memories, Minor canon divergence, Nightmares, POV First Person, Post-Trespasser, The Fade
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-01
Updated: 2017-07-01
Packaged: 2018-11-22 00:12:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11368551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gamerfic/pseuds/gamerfic
Summary: I've had this dream before.





	Where I Keep My Memories

**Author's Note:**

> Hello readers! Be forewarned, I'm not sure if this story will make very much sense as a stand-alone unless you've read the previous installments in the series, since it does make reference to some bits of character backstory and game-event-related headcanon this Lavellan has picked up along the way. However you choose to read it, I hope you enjoy it.

I've had this dream before.

I'm back in the ancient elven ruins beyond the Darvaarad, in the center of the _eluvian_ network. This time I am alone, even though in reality, Cole and Dorian and the Iron Bull stayed with me until the end. Viddasala and the other qunari are here, however, their petrified forms serving as the tombstones to mark yet another failed invasion. In the field of statues I see other, more familiar faces: my dead clanmates, my friends from the Inquisition, all the people I couldn't save. Some have not been turned to stone at all, but ripped apart by magic or cut to pieces by blades or claws. I don't want to walk through the carnage, don't want to discover its author waiting for me on the other side of the field of corpses. Something propels me inexorably forward until I reach Solas, who stands before the _eluvian_ that will carry him away from me forever.

He doesn't explain who he is, or what he did, or what he still hopes to do. In this dream, it is simply understood. He seizes my left arm, swiftly and roughly, the green energy of the Anchor spitting and crackling between his fingers. "This is mine," he growls. "Everything you are is mine. Everything you've done was only ever because of me. And now I have returned to reclaim everything you owe me."

His magic enters me, searing my flesh, leaving torment and suffering in its wake. I look up to meet his eyes and find no love or affection there, just vicious, sadistic delight in the pain he causes. I try to beg him to stop, to say something, _anything_ to dissuade him from the terrible path he has chosen, but only a scream comes out. I am screaming on the other side of the Veil as well, and the sound of my own agonized cries is what ultimately wakes me.

When I come back to myself I find I have been writhing in the bed, winding myself up in the sheets. I'm dangling halfway off the edge of the mattress, as if a spider had been wrapping me in silken threads in anticipation of devouring me. I feel myself losing my balance and put an arm out to steady myself, but remember my missing hand too late. I tip over the edge, and the wooden planks of the floor rush up to meet me. Before I land, soft hands catch me and lower me down safely to the ground.

"The Fade is its own place now," Cole murmurs in my ear. "It isn't this world, not anymore. What you fear can't hurt you. He wanted it that way."

" _Ma serannas_ ," I mumble. Cole is right; I never left the small single bedroom of the rustic cabin in the Free Marches that is now my home. The bright light streaming past the gauzy curtains tells me I've slept past mid-morning again. As I sit up, he moves to the foot of the bed, his open and innocent face carved with deep wrinkles of worry. This isn't the first time he's intervened in one of my darker moments. After the Exalted Council, he told me he intended to go wherever compassion was most needed. It troubles me to contemplate what it means that he's here now.

"You don't want me here," Cole says matter-of-factly as I disentangle myself from the sheets.

"Don't take it personally. I don't want anyone here."

"I don't. But they do. The Grand Clerics are fighting over some ridiculous technicality again. They've been at it all morning. Her mind wanders. Maker, this stupid headdress itches. The sea breeze through the window feels good. Kirkwall is somewhere out past that horizon. I wonder what the Inquisitor - no, I can't call her that anymore - is doing now. Varric said he would keep an eye on her. If I ever see Solas again I'm going to break every bone in his body. The Maker would probably smile on me if I did. I hope Varric doesn't ever write a book about the Inquisitor and the Dread Wolf _._ He should be focusing his energy on _Swords and Shields_ anyway."

"I hope Varric doesn't ever write about me, either," I say, feeling uncomfortable at seeing more of Cassandra than she might want to show me.

It doesn't seem to bother Cole. "He doesn't plan to. Not in public, anyway."

"How do you know? Have you been checking up on everyone from the Inquisition?"

He doesn't answer me directly. "The swamp is wet, cold. The mud back there about sucked one of his boots off. Is this Nevarra? Tevinter? Fuck if I know. Hey, look, it's another one of those big-ass wolf statues. Wonder what would happen if I climbed up there and smashed the shit out of it with my axe. Nah, Krem would just look at me like I'm crazy again. The boss would appreciate it though. I hope she's healing up. She still looked like shit when I left. She's tough, though. She'll fight again. Maybe I should have offered her a spot with the Chargers. Fucking statue in my way. Got even wetter going around it. How conceited do you have to be? If anyone ever made a statue of me I'd make sure it had the biggest - "

"Cole. Stop." He falls silent, brushing blond hair out of his eyes, every trace of Iron Bull suddenly erased. "I don't need to see anyone's memories to know my friends care about me."

"I know what he thinks, too," Cole says, and we both understand exactly who he means.

"I _definitely_ don't need to see him."

He shrugs in reply. "You can't stay here forever."

"I know that, too."

"They want you to come back."

"Funny. I want to be alone."

His eyes bore into me, searching, hurting. I wonder briefly if I'm going to have to order him to leave. Instead he says, "Don't forget to dream." Then, in an instant, he's gone.

Unsteadily, I stand up from the bed and shuffle over to the washstand. To my surprise, the pitcher is already full. I splash warm water on my face and move into the cabin's main living area. The shutters are flung wide open to admit the cool fresh air and soft sunlight of another perfect spring day. Provisions for the day's meals lay on the table, neatly arranged around a vase full of fresh-cut flowers. A fire is blazing in the hearth, and a peek out the side door reveals enough newly chopped firewood to last me for several days. Cole kept himself busy while I slept. Completing these same tasks would have taken me hours and left me completely drained afterwards. It's the greatest compassion he could have shown me, and he knows it.

I start sweeping meat and spices and chopped vegetables into a small iron cookpot and cover them with water to make soup, occasionally pausing to gaze out the window at the verdant forest around me. The title Varric bestowed upon me came with a modest manor house in Kirkwall, but I wasn't yet ready for the public scrutiny of becoming Comte Lavellan. But in the brief time I spent at the manor, I searched its study and uncovered the deed to the tiny, isolated hunting lodge I now inhabit. It's perfect - peaceful, solitary, familiar without being too much like the lands in which my clan was massacred, and leagues away from anyone or anything who might intrude upon my grief. Except for Cole, of course, and the dreadful, vivid nightmares that still plague me every time I close my eyes.

When the pot is full, it's heavy enough that I struggle to lift it one-handed and to hang it on the hook above the flames. Broth sloshes over the rim, sizzling and steaming as it drenches the glowing coals. I reach out to steady the vessel with my nonexistent left hand and curse. Then I wince at both the cramp in my right arm from holding so much weight and the maddening unscratchable itch, ceaselessly prickling at the empty space below my left elbow.

My nightmares notwithstanding, I don't really remember what losing my arm felt like. I remember kneeling next to Solas on the ground, feeling the firm pressure of his hand on my wrist and the warmth of his lips against mine. I remember closing my eyes, leaning into the kiss - then the sudden sensation of nothingness when he pulled away, the loss of both his presence and the pain that had plagued me for longer than I cared to admit. When I opened my eyes I saw the flat blue surface of the _eluvian_ swallowing up his silhouette. Only then did I realize that both the mark and my arm were gone. For all his other faults, Solas took away most of my physical suffering along with the Anchor. I suppose I should thank him for it.

Despite the lack of pain, my mind and body still reeled from the trauma of loss. My memory is also unclear as to how Cole and Bull and Dorian got me out of the Darvaarad, or what the healers at the Winter Palace did to what was left of my arm, or the tearful speech I'm told I gave to the Exalted Council as I formally dissolved the Inquisition. After that came long weeks of convalescence in a chantry in Halamshiral, their details blurred by fever and strong tinctures of prophet's laurel, until my physical wounds healed and I re-learned how to care for myself. From there I went to Kirkwall, and to my cabin, and to the solitude I now inhabit.

Eventually I decide staring into the fire won't make the soup cook any faster. There's a comfortable chair beside the window overlooking a grove of apple trees, and I settle in to wait with an armload of books and scrolls. Too soon I find my gaze drifting up and out to the horizon, my thoughts falling back into the familiar pattern of self-pity I can't seem to shake. I have no Inquisition, no clan, no faith in my gods, no lover, no Anchor, no arm, no strength to fight nor will to go on. I am thirty-seven years old and I have lost everything. I can no longer see any path apart from the one Solas chose for me unknowingly when he woke from his long slumber and vowed to fix the world he believed he had broken.

By the time the soup is ready, the sunlight has taken on the warm deep glow of early evening. I've accomplished nothing today beyond staring out the window and feeling sorry for myself. It's no different from every other day I've spent here, really. I find a bowl and ladle soup into it, spilling more than a little on the floorboards between the hearth and the table. My senses distantly register that the meal is delicious, rich and well-seasoned and full of all my favorite ingredients, but the taste brings me no pleasure. Very few things do anymore.

Tidying up after dinner occupies more of my time than it should, although the sun still hasn't set when I'm finished. I ignore the early hour as I make my way back to bed; I'm exhausted. When I was the Inquisitor I used to march for days at a time, through all kinds of weather and over all kinds of terrain. I subsisted on a few hours of broken sleep a night and punctuated my journeys with unending vicious battles. When Solas took the Anchor and my arm, he took away my strong, tireless self, too. He left behind a frail husk of a woman who breaks a sweat from scrubbing out a pot and sleeps half her life away.

I've wasted yet another day. There's no use in fighting it. I crawl back into my bed and pull the covers over my head to shield me from the birdsong and the breeze. I close my eyes.

And again, I dream.

I wake abruptly in my bed to a deafening clap of thunder. A sudden, violent storm is raging outside my cabin. Chilly rain blows in through the open shutters. Lightning strikes nearby and briefly illuminates my room - and in its purple flash I see a dark figure standing in my door. Another flash. He's closer now. I would recognize his silhouette anywhere.

I try to climb out of bed and flee through the window, but I'm tangled in the sheets and I can't free myself. As my fingers scrabble against the knotted bedclothes, I realize distantly, _I have both my arms. I'm dreaming._ It's too late for me to do anything about it. The next bolt of lightning reveals Solas's face, inches from mine. His hand darts out, closes around my throat, and squeezes. "Did you think I would abandon you now, _ma vhenan?_ " he growls mockingly. "You know too much. I can never permit you to be free."

 _Wake up, wake up, wake up,_ I tell myself, but it's no use. I'm trapped. I can't breathe, can't fight back. I close my eyes so I won't have to see the hatred in his, and resign myself to my fate...

...Until I feel a new, firm grip on my shoulders and someone pulls me away from him.

The room fills with warm light. The scene shifts around me and I find I'm not in my cabin anymore but back in Skyhold, in the quarters that used to be mine before I gave my fortress up, along with every other part of the Inquisition. The person who intervened is still behind me, a dark and anxious presence. I turn toward them and discover Solas sitting beside me on the bed.

He's wearing the same simple tunic he always used to wear, not the ostentatious armor I remember from the Darvaarad and from my earlier dreams. His face is full of compassion and concern. "Thorn," he says worriedly - and ironically, the fact that he _never_ uses my given name tells me this is really him and not just another cruel figment of my nightmares.

"Don't call me that," I say.

"I can scarcely call you Inquisitor anymore."

"So you've heard, then." He nods, faintly. "I suppose I shouldn't be surprised, with the number of spies you had in the Winter Palace."

"Indeed," he says in a tone as stiff as his posture. He holds his spine straight and rigid, as if he's terrified of what it might mean if he leaned either toward me or away from me. His hands rest awkwardly on his knees as he fixes his gaze on the blank wall in front of him. I wonder if he can feel me staring at the side of his head.

"Why are you here?" I ask, and immediately wish I'd said _Go away_ instead.

The tips of his ears flush pink. "My journeys brought me to a place I'd never been within the Fade, adjacent to the realms of purest instinct. Within its depths a spirit called, and begged for aid, and led me here. My will was weak. I could not help but answer."

"What kind of a spirit was it?" I ask as understanding slowly dawns on me.

"Compassion."

"Cole," we say simultaneously. He arranged this from the start, knowing Solas would answer his call and come to me in the Fade. Of course he would believe this is compassion. Whether he's right remains to be seen. 

Solas, caught up as always in the wonder of discovery, turns toward me as if he's forgotten he can't bear to look at me. Every bit of him is the same as it always was. The sudden heat of rage blooms in my gut as I think, _Everything that happened has changed him so little._ Most of my skill in lucid dreaming left me along with the mark, but I bring every remaining scrap of it to bear on making my dream-self identical to my waking self. I need him to see exactly what has become of me since the Darvaarad, since he abandoned me yet again.

My actions have the desired effect. " _Ir abelas_ ," he says softly, averting his eyes. Some small cruel part of me delights in the sight of his shame. "I should not have come here. I never would have, had I better understood Cole's attempts to manipulate the circumstances. I will leave you in peace."

"A little late, don't you think?" Anger surges in me, bringing with it a sharp bitter clarity far preferable to the depression I've spent months mired in. "I'll never be at peace again after what you did." I'm not entirely sure what I'm referring to the Anchor, or how he led me on and left me, or how he hid his true identity and his mission, or the pain of everything I've lost because of his actions, or some other wrong I can't even begin to name.

"We've had this conversation too many times before," he snaps back.

"Then walk away and stop having it."

"Perhaps I shall." Solas starts to get up from the bed.

"If you do, I don't want to see that wolf in my dreams anymore, either."

He stops in his tracks. _He didn't know I knew it was him._ With a sigh, he sits down and meets my gaze again. "I shouldn't have done that either."

" _Fenedhis_ , Solas, it doesn't have to be so hard. If you want to stay with me, then _stay_."

"You know I can't," he says, sadly yet firmly.

"You're right. I do. But _you_ know I'd still let you if you changed your mind."

Solas falls silent, not looking away, his expression softening into thoughtfulness. He must be thinking of our final meeting on the other side of the Veil, just as I am. "And _you_ shouldn't do _that_ ," he tells me firmly.

"Probably not," I say with a sardonic smile. "But when have I ever made the wise choice?" He smiles too, perhaps in spite of himself, and for a moment I can almost pretend things might go back to the way they were before. Then the empty space itches where my left arm and the Anchor used to be, and I know some things are impossible even in the Fade.

HIs voice has dwindled to barely more than a whisper. "I can't continue doing this. It isn't fair to either of us."

"I know." We've at this conversation, or one much like it, too many times before. Repeating it is our last and most pathetic excuse to continue speaking. "I've tried so hard to stop." The memory uncontrollably summoned by those words wells up to the surface of my awareness. Its sudden intensity threatens to project itself into the Fade around us. I don't want Solas to see it, don't want him to learn the full truth of what I almost did, but I can't control my dreams well enough to prevent it. The past washes over both of us and temporarily sweeps everything else away.

* * *

I don't know where I am except that I'm in bed. Somewhere in Orlais, maybe - at least I thought I heard Leliana speaking Orlesian to someone out in the corridor, beyond the dark wood of the heavy closed door. Did I hear it yesterday, or the day before? I can't be sure, and it bothers me.

Time moves oddly here. The hours smear into each other in a blur of pain and fever. My small room is windowless and low-ceilinged, empty but for my bed and a table and a fireplace in which yellow flames constantly flicker. When I am alert enough to register my surroundings, their relentless sameness only magnifies my sense of isolation. I spend dazed, hazy hours staring at the blank wall in front of me, uncontrollably remembering how I once stared at the unfinished sketch of one of Solas's fresco panels in the Skyhold rotunda and tried in vain to decipher the message he'd been trying to leave. I understand it all too well now. Once, when Leliana happens to be in the room with me, I ask her why she's brought me here. All she'll say is, "It is for your protection." I have no idea who or what she's protecting me from.

Most of the time, I'm too delirious to ask questions. My body struggles desperately against everything it's endured. I hallucinate when I'm awake and suffer vivid nightmares when I sleep. Solas features prominently in all of them, stalking me, hurting me, making love to me, apologizing to me. Watching me. I can't tell if he's really there with me in the Fade or if I'm imagining it all. But how would I begin to tell the difference even if I had all my wits about me? _The Veil is thin here,_ the ghost of him whispers, and I let out a joyless bark of laughter that startles the poor healer who's come in to change the dressing on the stump of my left arm. She fumbles for a draught of prophet's laurel and pours it into my mouth. The thick, sticky syrup bears me down again into the dreamless deep.

The next thing I'm aware of is soft, small hands smoothing my hair away from my clammy brow. I turn toward the sensation and see Cole perched on the edge of the bedside table like some strange, gangly bird. My mind clears at his touch, my confusion evaporating along with the sweat on my skin. " _Ma serannas_ ," I murmur.

"Yes." He helps me to sit up and swing my legs over the side of the bed. He supports me with one hand in the small of my back until my dizziness passes. A cup of cool water is already in his other hand, and I drain it three times before my thirst is slaked.

"I thought you were going back to the Fade," I say, wiping my mouth.

"I go where I'm needed most. You need me now."

"And what do you think I need, Cole?"

"Peace," he says, "and healing magic. A good night's sleep, and another after it. A cozy little home beside a stream. Nourishing food, and friends to share it with. And later, when you're ready, the strength to go on doing the right thing."

I squeeze my eyes shut and fight back hot tears. All of those things sound so wonderful - but how can I enjoy them, knowing what I know? He's right, though - I need to rest, to recover myself, and I can think of only one way to make it happen. I look up into his worried face and say, "Then take it away from me, Cole. Make me forget."

He furrows his brow. "Forget the pain?"

"Sort of. Not exactly. I mean forget _Solas_."

Cole cocks his head and pauses to consider my request. Then he says calmly, "No."

"Why not?" I almost add something like _I thought you wanted to help me, how could you let me suffer like this, aren't you my friend?_ \- but something in his manner tells me that arguing won't get me anywhere.

"It isn't in my nature."

"You mean it wouldn't be compassionate."

Cole gives a slight nod, barely perceptible. "I know it hurts. More than anyone else can imagine. To be separated in an instant from what had always been there, as near to you as your own soul. In those days, there was no space between having a thought and reaching out to make it real. And when it was lost, even though it had to be lost, I could not bear it. I fled from myself rather than face what I could never be again." He blinks rapidly, looking as confused as I feel. "I'm not sure why I remember that. He didn't want me to. I suppose _you_ needed to remember it. So when the time comes, you'll understand why you have to do it. It wouldn't be kind of me to prevent it."

"What do you mean by 'it?'" I ask, but he vanishes mid-sentence without answering. On the surface, it seems he's avoiding the question. But I know Cole - and myself - well enough to know it's much more complicated. It isn't in Cole's nature to cause harm, any more than it's in my nature to walk away from the truth or give up the quest I've begun. Even so, as my head pounds and my body shakes in the aftermath of the fever, giving up has never tempted me more.

* * *

Like the tide the memory ebbs and recedes, leaving Solas and me stunned. He can't meet my eyes now. "I had no idea," he mumbles.

"How could you have? It isn't as if you ever cared about anything but your own plans in the end."

"You know that isn't true."

"You're right. I do." He quirks an eyebrow, surprised by the admission, so I continue. "I always thought you took it better when I got angry about things you did instead of being sad. It's like I kept trying to protect you by choosing which emotions to express." Shaking my head, I let out a soft, wistful laugh. "Ridiculous, right?"

"Perhaps - but also compassionate, in its way. An area in which you excel, and I have fallen short." _No argument here,_ I think but don't say. "I have misled you in many ways. But in the matter of what you have been to me, please believe I was never anything but true."

This time, I feel Solas's memories surging around us. For a moment, panic fills his face before he relaxes into what the Fade is doing to us. Maybe this is the only gift he can give me - an answer, at last, to the question of what he'd been thinking. I let it sweep us both away. How could I possibly refuse him?

* * *

The first thing to draw me to her is the way she listens. As the Herald of Andraste, she can scarcely walk from one end of Haven's chantry to the other without being interrupted by a dozen people's demands. One would expect her to rush through every conversation for the sake of squeezing as many tasks as possible into each turn of the hourglass. But when she talks to me, she acts as if I am the only other elf in Thedas. Even my experiences in the Fade fascinate her, and she asks about them so avidly that I know she isn't simply being polite. Even our debates and disagreements are far preferable to the superficial interactions I've come to expect from the beings of this age. I never knew that about myself until now. Sometimes I wonder how she would react if I reached for her and kissed her mid-sentence. For so many reasons, I cannot permit it to happen. Even if I could, she could not possibly think of me the same.

But it seems she does. I say all the right things after I finally give in and kiss her in the Fade - _impulsive, ill-considered, it won't happen again._ She responds with teasing banter and a disbelieving smile - and indeed, soon enough she proves me wrong. I help to shield and shape her experience of the Fade, fending off her nightmares and also reminding myself to stay as far away from her as possible. Yet when I hear her calling my name from the depths of a dream, I rush toward her even though I know perfectly well that my wards have held and she is in no real danger. I slip through a crack in the barrier I erected and into her world. It is a mistake. She lies in tall grass in the arms of an imagined lover she has conjured, lost in a tangle of bare limbs and searching mouths. She did not call my name because she was frightened - and why would I expect a woman of her strength and skill to cry out to me for rescue anyway? No, she called my name because her lover wears my face. For so many reasons, I should not be here. I should depart and pretend I never saw this. But when she notices me, as she inevitably must, I do not flee even though I easily could. Instead, I babble an inane justification for my presence. _Do you want me?_ she asks, and I give in to temptation yet again and answer her honestly. _Yes._ In the grip of so many other lies, it feels right to tell the truth, just this once.

Except it isn't only once. In the Fade I come back to her again and again, joining a perilous and painstaking dance, drawing ever nearer to her even as my own good sense screams that I should be pushing her away. When at last we give in to each other in the physical world that is all she truly knows, I lie awake beside her deep in Skyhold's black belly and wonder what I have done. She will think of this as real now, will not be able to help treating me differently. _But it_ is _real,_ a small voice inside me objects. Lying beside her in the dark, amidst a nest of blankets that does little to dispel the chill of the cracked marble floor beneath us, panic rises in me as I realize I have meant everything I have said. And still she sleeps on peacefully, her body curling toward mine, naked and trusting and knowing nothing at all of what I have done or what I will do. Quietly, so as not to wake her, I rise and dress and gather my things. How can I bear to look at her now? I must find some way to bring an end to this before I can cause her further harm.

But I don't. How could I, when I see her move with total confidence and strength through the Raw Fade, and unravel every scheme lurking within the Winter Palace as if intrigue came as easily to her as breathing? So great is my infatuation that in Halamshiral, after I have watched her bend the rulers of Orlais to her will, I do something I never thought I would do. _I let her into my dreams._ If I have misjudged her ability yet again, if the Anchor has made her into a Dreamer like me, she can peer beneath the surface of my idle fantasies to find all my secrets laid bare. But she doesn't. I wonder if she understands the full extent of my submission to her on that night, even as I worship her with my body and my words. Regardless, we both feel the honesty of the _ar lath ma, vhenan_ we whisper to each other. And I learn that even if I succeed in the task I have set for myself, I will still be doomed.

In the end I nearly tell her everything anyway. After she drinks from the _vir'abelasan_ , binding herself eternally to the will of Mythal, I love her all the same despite the horror I feel at her decision. But when the moment of truth comes and she stands before me, open and trusting and ready to listen as always, my wisdom (or perhaps my fear) wins out. I can't go through with it. Instead I take the _vallaslin_ from her face - perhaps a kindness in itself, albeit not one I had intended - and, steeling my spirit, tell her that what we have shared must end. I do it quickly and without warning, the way one might pull a bramble from a child's bare heel. This way, she has no time to anticipate the blow and I have no chance to convince myself not to strike it. She reacts with all the hurt and anger and sarcasm I expected, but there is a sadness beneath it I didn't anticipate. "I will see you back at Skyhold," I say, and turn from her abruptly so she cannot see the tears in my own eyes. This is not the first time I have damaged something beyond repair.

The worst of it is that I can't leave her yet. As long as she bears the mark of my power, as long as she pursue Corypheus, I must remain at her side lest I abandon the quest for which I have already sacrificed so much. It's a relief when the Elder One brings the battle to Skyhold. No matter the outcome of the fight, this means the end of all my deception, the final tearing away of every veil within which I have shrouded my true self. Or so I once believed. When Corypheus falls, the orb - _my_ orb - falls along with him. I don't see it shatter, hadn't realized it _could_ shatter. One more impossible thing the Inquisitor has done. She tries to comfort me with sympathetic, meaningless platitudes as I kneel amidst the shards of my focus. My distress is not so much about the destruction of the orb as it is about the knowledge that I'm not finished yet. Cassandra calls her name and she turns away, and I think, _This is my second chance._ I could give up my foolish quest right now and choose to accept the world I have made despite its brokenness. Perhaps, if I were very fortunate, I could even choose her all over again. But I don't. While she's distracted, I pull the Fade around me and cloak myself in impenetrable invisibility. The next time she looks for me I will be gone, vanished into this disaster of my own making. _I will hurt her this last time,_ I promise myself, _and then no more._

I'm lying, of course. I will see her again. She cannot evade me because no mortal could carry so much of me and live. She will seek me out eventually to return the curse I gave to her. By the time she finally does, the mark threatens to consume her entirely. The instant I see her, shaking and struggling to stand, all her formidable strength subsumed by mine as never before, I know I owe her the truth. I will never have another opportunity to share it. "I suspect you have questions," I begin, but she cuts me off. She already knows. _(And here my own memories reflect his, echoing the sick sad feeling that built in my gut with each scrap of parchment and each fresco I discovered, until I stood face to face with him and blurted out the terrible truth neither of us could deny any longer.)_ "Very good," I murmur, no longer even trying to conceal how her cleverness astounds me. I will always be in awe of her, as I have been before.

I do my best to explain the rest of it to her. She asks if she can join me, as I suspected she would. I also suspect she knew I would never allow it. Her motives lie not in true commitment to my cause, but in desperation to bring down my empire from the inside. If they do not, and she follows me out of love instead of ideology, it is even worse. Because I have rejected her, she will have no choice but to stop me. Neither one of us would have it another way.

The Anchor keeps expanding as we converse, eating her alive, until the pain is no longer merely distracting but too much to bear. There is so much more I wish I could say to her, but I only have time for this single act of mercy. I take her hand in mine and begin to take back my power. Something in me cries out, _Don't let this be the last time you touch her,_ and suddenly I am kissing her before I can second-guess myself. Then the magic ebbs and she falls to the ground, senseless with the pain of the loss of all that named her Herald of Andraste.

I retreat hastily through the nearest _eluvian_ , into the embrace of my hidden sanctum. The surface of the mirror goes solid and opaque behind me. I press my back against it and sink slowly down to the cold, hard floor. I am finished. It is over. Her words echo in my ears - _Solas, var lath vir suledin -_ and they are truer than anything I have heard in millennia. I lower my head and wrap my arms around my knees. Without an ounce of shame, I squeeze my eyes tightly shut and weep for everything I have lost, and everything I have left to lose.

* * *

I come back to myself, feeling hollowed out and numb in the places where Solas poured his power into me. "You know this doesn't change anything," I hear myself say. "No matter how much you meant it."

He nods once, briskly, forcing himself to look at me. "Yes."

"I still have to stop you."

Another faint nod, wordless this time.

"Gods damn it, Solas, it doesn't have to be this way."

"I believe we have ably established that it does."

"Then you leave me no choice." I finally grasp the shape of what I have to do, and if I don't start now I may never begin. I reach for him and pull his face down to mine. His skin is warm and soft beneath my fingertips. I kiss him as if nothing but this moment matters, as if I've forgotten everything that came before.

I take my time, but it has to end. When we separate, I hold his gaze for a long and lingering moment. There is so much more I could say to him, but all I say is what I should have said years ago. " _Ar lath ma,_ Solas. You know I always will. But I'm not letting you into my dreams again."

I wake up gradually, like the tide receding. The afterimage of his face, its expression wistful and resigned, burns behind my eyelids and then slowly fades. It's still nighttime when I open my gritty eyes. My cheeks are damp with drying tears, but some of my sadness seems to have lifted. My way forward is clear even before I see, by the light of the dying embers in the hearth, the other gift Cole left for me that I hadn't noticed until now. My traveling pack, neatly assembled and organized with my cloak draped over it and my neglected sword leaning against it. _He always did believe in me, even when I couldn't believe in myself._

The next steps on my journey are as clear to me as they must have been to cole. I wasn't lying to Solas when I told him I had to stop him. He's probably already imagining I'll recreate the Inquisition, recruit mages and templars and soldiers and assassins and spies and diplomats to confront him, raise armies and build fortifications and do all the things he's seen me do to other enemies before. But trying to match my strength to his would be a fool's errand, a battle I couldn't hope to win. My victory over him, when it comes, will be of a different sort.

Solas is powerful, incredibly so, but it's not what makes him most dangerous. What I saw in his memories proved as much. He's a threat because he refuses to consider whether he might be wrong. That kind of certainty is risky for anyone, from the most ancient god to the newest Dalish Keeper's apprentice. If I defeat him without changing his mind, it won't be enough. He'll just regroup and try again, like he's done so many times before. Only by obliterating the foundations of his certainty that I will be assured of stopping him once and for all.

I wish I could say my motives were entirely noble. I'll probably tell my allies I want to save him from himself, of course. It's what they've come to expect of me, and Solas himself taught me it's usually best not to correct others' mistaken assumptions about you. But the truth is, the physical things Solas took from me don't hurt nearly as much as the rest of it does. I want to avenge the loss of my faith, of my childlike trust in a world that made sense. I don't only want to convince him he's wrong about the Veil because it will save reality. I want him to understand what it feels like to have everything you ever believed about existence, about _yourself_ , upended and ripped away from you. I want him to know, in the depths of his soul, that he was wrong about everything from the start. I will take from him not just his mission, but everything that made him believe in its righteousness. I'm after his mind and his legacy now. And only when I have claimed them, when he lies shattered before me, when he doubts himself as I have doubted myself every day since I met him, will I ask him how he intends to right all the wrongs he has committed.

When did I say that I would save you?

I get out of bed, spurred on by the ache in my missing arm and the newfound spark my plan has ignited in me. It's the middle of the night, but I can't go back to sleep now. I have too much work to do. Soon I'll leave this place, find the people who have remained loyal to me in the Inquisition's absence, and figure out where to begin. My memories will guide me forward now, past all the mistakes I'll never make again.

The future stretches out before me like the wall where a fresco is about to be painted. No one but me gets to decide what will go there. I wonder if Solas felt this way when he first imagined the Veil or its ending, or when he first gripped my wrist and put his power into me and changed the course of my life forever. No dreams can confuse me anymore, nor nightmares frighten me. I know my path, and I will not be swayed from it. I am awake. And I am ready.

**Author's Note:**

> Story and series title are from ["In Sleep" by Lissie](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bL4jdHifA0A).
> 
> I originally conceived of this series as two interrelated vignettes. It eventually blossomed (or maybe just ballooned) into the 10-story, 65,000-word behemoth it is now. I wouldn't have written so much, or gotten as involved in the Solavellan end of Dragon Age fandom as I did, without the wonderful feedback and encouragement I received from all of you. So thank you for reading my stories, and for joining me in my life-ruining Solas obsession. :) Although I'm done with this series now, I'm definitely not done with Solas or with Dragon Age in general, so I hope you'll check back on my AO3 page now and then (or maybe even subscribe to me). Thanks again, everyone.


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